It started out with the best intentions.  Really, it did.  I knew I had to get a hold of the doctor's office this morning...when it rains, it pours around here.  Bryson's shots were on Friday...well, of course we would be back in the office before this week's end.  Reasa awoke yesterday with a sore ear...she is prone to swimmer's ear, as she is the fish of the family and I can't keep her out of the pool (nor do I try).  I knew the doctor's office opened at 8:30...at which point I began calling.  And continued to call.  And prodded the children to get around as I did--the girls had gymnastics at 9:30.  9:15, the time when we always leave, came and went.  No sweet receptionist picking up the phone, even 45 minutes after the scheduled opening time.  Reasa tried to convince me at this moment (about 9:23) that her ear wasn't that bad, and that she didn't need to go to the doctor (at which point I walked over and attempted to touch her ear lobe and she shrieked and ran away.  Yeah, right, Kater.)  I called that crazy office 100 times if I called once, and finally, at 10:00, someone answered the phone.  They scheduled her for the appointment at 11:00, the girls howled that they didn't want to miss all of their second-to-last gymnastics session (we had friends coming over for lunch, so I didn't want to schedule an appointment for the afternoon)(ugh.  The things you have to weigh!!), so we showed up 35 minutes late for gymnastics, and left 45 minutes later (class doesn't get over until 11:30, and we didn't get there until 10:05).  We sat in that blessed doctor's office for an hour and 20 minutes before we were seen.  No one said anything to us...no "Oh, Mrs. Frazer, we're sorry, but we're running behind," no nothing.  We just sat there.  The kids were angelic--no, really.  They could not have been better behaved if I had kept them occupied with lollipops and videos...they read magazines and played with a fisher price farm so sweetly.  Truly one of those proud-to-be-their-Mommy moments.  When the nurse finally did come to get us, I was on the phone out in front of the building (in clear view of the lobby) apologizing to the mom we had plans with for the afternoon...considering we were still at the doctor's office, and she was supposed to already be at the house with her kids, plans changed rather significantly.  We finally got the explanation: they had a staff meeting that morning that went long, and started out the morning 45 minutes behind schedule.  Well, wouldn't it have been wonderful for them to have told me on the phone when I called that an 11:00 appointment would really be closer to 12??  As it was, we found out she not only has swimmer's ear, but a significant waxy build-up (which she has also been prone to), and possibly impetigo.  So, our very nice Physician's Assitant gave us antibiotic for her ear, drops for her ear, instructions how to eliminate and prevent waxy build-up and what to do in case the patch by her lip wasn't impetigo and didn't go away with antibiotics.  It only took us an hour and 45 minutes to have this happen.  We finally did get home (after filling the prescription, picking up ear plugs (which she HATES), and finding a bargain on water shoes for Reasa, which she won't wear because she refuses to get in the lake where we're camping next week.  But that's a different story).  Our friends did come over, and we had a lovely afternoon...right up until the last 15 minutes or so.

 

Have your kids ever hidden on you?  No, not the kind of hiding where you hear them giggling from behind the curtain in the living room or outright laughing from inside the hall closet.  Not the kind where they hide together and can't stop whispering so as to not give away their spot.  I'm talking about the kind of hiding where you seriously can't find them.  At all.  And panic slowly begins to set in.  Panic fueled by that of another mom.  Who is also missing a child.  Who is thinking the same thought you're thinking:  "Someone has taken these children."  We searched the attic, the basement, the camper, the bottom of the pool, the closets, the street, the neighbors' driveways...and we searched, I'm not kidding you, for 15 minutes.  As I walked in the door after scouring the nearby vicinity outside, I literally was looking for my phone to call the police, when I heard this saintly mother who was visiting with her children call out, "I found them!!" in horrified jubilation.  You see, her 4-year-old son and my 5-year-old boy had been hiding nearly silently under my girls' bed the whole time.  I'm not sure if it was the abject panic in Kim's voice or the words, "Boys, this isn't funny any more, you need to come out RIGHT NOW!" which caused my son to squirm out from under the sweaty underneath-the-bunkbed area (none of my kids have ever ventured under beds...they hate dark places as much as I do!), or if he was just tired of the game, but out he came.  (He later commented that he was just hot and didn't want to hide any more.  Hmm.)  Earlier in the visit, Lukie had hidden in the cabinets in our back room--we had both watched him go in, and had played along with the "I wonder where Lukie is?" game...very cute.  Not so cute when we have run up and down the steps 10-15 times calling their names and telling them we are really scared and they need to come out.    They were both laughing when they came out...right up until we both took them to separate rooms and scolded them, telling them how scared we all were and that we both thought someone had taken them.  Bryson looked at me with horrified eyes...apologized and said he was just playing with Lukie.  He didn't know it would scare me.  I heard Kim uttering nearly the same words to Lukie, who explained that he didn't want to leave, and that he wanted to play the leapfrog game so he told Bryson not to come out.

 

I have never been so thankful a game had ended in my life.  I have played many long, boring, drawn-out Monopoly games I was glad to have over (and spent my money in very frivolous ways to get us to that end more quickly).  More than one game of war has taken altogether too long.  15 minutes seemed like hours this afternoon.  I hugged that boy till I was afraid he wouldn't be able to breathe anymore.  I'm not sure I'm going to let them play out of my sight ever again.  I'm not sure Kim will ever let them play together again PERIOD. 

 

No, she assured me that she would.  She also let me know later that Lukie told her it was his idea.  :) 

 

You know those moments as a mom?  Those moments where you rejoice for the child you were given?  The ones that follow those moments where you want to scream and cry really loud?  Yeah.  Today was full of those moments.  Thank God this is the job I chose.  If somebody had forced me to do this job...wow...I would be hunting that person down.